IRC (Internet Relay Chat) is used frequently by Team Fortress Wiki editors, moderators, and administrators to coordinate their wiki efforts. The #tfwiki channel hosted on irc.freenode.net is the channel used most frequently.

Access to the channel is free for all users, and those who are not regularly active on the wiki are encouraged to join the channel to collaborate with others. It may take some time for other users to notice you, so don't leave 10 seconds after saying hi.

The channel bot, Spacenet, has been configured to broadcast items on Special:RecentChanges to all users within the channel.

Additionally, users on the channel with "voice" (usually represented by a '+' or 'v' sign in front of their names) are staff members (mods/admins). Feel free to contact them in private if you have any concerns or need help.

Rules

Please always follow admin/mod instructions.

The #tfwiki channel is primarily meant to help users edit, and discuss wiki-related matters. While idle chatter is not prohibited or discouraged, it should not interfere with users actively trying to have wiki-related discussions.

Do not troll, denigrate, or otherwise insult users in the channel.

Do not post links to obscene or NSFW (not safe for work) material in the channel.

Do not flood the channel or cause spam of any type. If you need to post a long blob of text, use Pastie.

Do not impersonate admins, mods, or other users.

Do not use bot-reserved highlights/stalk words (see below).

Do not cause bot spam (the use of bot commands repeatedly, not necessarily by the same user, to the point where the conversation becomes meaningless or hard to follow).

Speculation about upcoming content releases is permitted, as long as it doesn't get out of hand, e.g. declaring said speculation as factual information. Spoilers related to upcoming releases, even when unrelated to Team Fortress 2, are not permitted. Read the topic to find out the current standing regarding releases.

People disrespecting any of these rules will be warned, kicked, muted, or banned, depending on the extent and repetitiveness of the offense.

Discussion

Discussion in the channel is also publicly logged. Logs can be viewed here. In addition to #tfwiki , the #tfwiki-rc channel can be used to monitor RCs without chatter; this channel also includes bot edits. Logs are available here, bypassing the need to actually be in the channel in order to follow the recent changes.

Any decisions made or "agreed to" in the channel should not always be considered definitive. The number of users who contribute to the wiki but do not use the channel is high, and thus the discussion can exclude these contributors. Because of this, discussions that are of interest to everyone should take place on talk pages instead.

Highlights/Stalk tags

Highlight keywords, or stalk tags are simple little keywords. Users can set their IRC client to beep whenever those words are contained within a message.

Misuse of a keyword is a kickable/bannable offense; this includes "testing" their usage.

The following keywords are defined:

~tf2update: Posted by the bot Spacenet whenever the TF2 blog has been updated, or a patch has been posted. Should not be used by anyone else.

~tf2blogupdate: Posted by the bot Spacenet whenever the TF2 blog has been updated. Should not be used by anyone else.

~tf2patch: Posted by the bot Spacenet whenever a TF2 patch has been released. Should not be used by anyone else.

~tf2schema: Posted by the bot Spacenet whenever the TF2 schema has been updated. Should not be used by anyone else.

~staff: Highlights all staff members currently present in the channel. Can be used whenever asking for help that requires staff intervention or permissions (deletions, protected page editing, etc.) Use conservatively.

~loc-xx: Highlights all translators of the language "xx" (ru, fr, es, de, etc.) who have opted to listen to this stalk tag. Can be used whenever help is needed regarding articles in a particular language.

~spam: Flags down staff to deal with spambots.

tfwiki cloaks

All editors that have an IRC nickname registered with NickServ can request a cloak. Please note that as the GRF-f application with the initial list of cloaks has already been sent it will simply take longer before a newly-requested cloak is applied.

The naming pattern is tfwiki/role/wiki-username, which allows you to use any nickname yet still be identifiable by your Wiki username. role is either editor, staff or bot.